Flappy birds

Nguyen Ha Dong, the developer of sensational game Flappy Bird
Nguyen Ha Dong, who has been in the headlines first for Flappy Bird hitting the bull's-eye and then his withdrawal of the online game from app stores, met Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam Tuesday amid rumors he had committed suicide. Online newspaper VnExpress said Dam, who is in charge of culture, society, science, and education, encouraged Dong to continue with his passion for developing games. Dong is a new talent that needs support and Vietnam needs talents like him for its development, he was quoted as saying. The meeting took place two days after the 29-year-old indie game developer pulled out Flappy Bird game from app stores after it had been downloaded tens of millions of times. Shortly after he did that an unidentified "news source" was quoted online as saying that Dong was found dead at home with a gunshot wound in his head. It claimed that authorities had said the suicide had something to do … [Read more...] about Flappy Bird creator meets Vietnam deputy PM

VietNamNet Bridge - It is obvious that Flappy Bird has brought big money to its father - Nguyen Ha Dong, a 29-year-old programmer. However, experts believe that it is Google which benefits most from the bird.
Being a free app, the only source of income for its author is from ads. Dong, like other developers, can make money by allowing AdMob (Google) to embed codes into the game to display ads on the screen.
Nguyen Anh Tuan, Director of ePi Technologies believes that the Dong's bird can bring $50,000 a day or more with AdMob.
Supposed that 10 percent of the 50 million downloads (5 million) is the number players every day and that 0.4 percent of players (in ideal scenario) clicks the ads, then there would be 300,000 ad clicks every day.
If noting that Google pays $0.2 for every ad click on average in the US and UK, and $0.02 in Vietnam, the total income of the developer could be $60,000.
An expert, who asked to be anonymous, said he has doubts about the announced figure of … [Read more...] about Who benefits most from Flappy Bird?

The "Flappy Bird" game is deceptively simple: Users tap smartphone screens to make a bird fly through gaps in pipes to score points. Anytime the bird hits a pipe or drops to the ground, the game ends. Fans post their scores on Facebook Inc.
The Hanoi developer who removed his "Flappy Bird" game from app stores after becoming a global sensation and earning as much as $50,000 a day experienced the kind of success few individual programmers encounter. Nguyen Ha Dong, creator of the difficult game with a simple design that shot to the top of the most-popular download rankings, removed "Flappy Bird" from Apple (AAPL) Inc. and Google (GOOG) Inc. online stores this past weekend. He said in a Twitter Inc. message that the game "ruins my simple life." Dong, who said on Twitter he has been a programmer for 10 years, didn't answer repeated calls or text messages to his mobile phone today. Yet his success, viewed as an anomaly by industry insiders, could be a boost to Vietnam's fledgling … [Read more...] about ‘Flappy Bird’ grounded as Vietnamese developer pulls plug on app

Before deciding to put an end to his beloved work, Nguyen Ha Dong, the Vietnamese creator of Flappy Bird, a top-downloaded game on Apple's App Store and Google's Play Store, tweeted that he would remove the game from the two app stores on Sunday.
On Saturday, Dong, nicknamed dongatory on Twitter, said "I can call 'Flappy Bird' a success of mine. But it also ruined my simple life. So now I hate it," at 2:15 am before stating "I am sorry 'Flappy Bird' users, 22 hours from now, I will take 'Flappy Bird' down. I cannot take this anymore," at 11:02 am. Undoubtedly, the international and local media played a very important role in promoting the game and its Vietnamese creator, but it is also the media that put pressure on Dong so that he finally decided to remove it and cut the media off, refusing further inquires. The news about the removal of the game stirred international media, as did the news that it became a top-downloaded game on the two stores and enabled the developer to earn … [Read more...] about The rise and fall of Flappy Bird, spurred by the media

VietNamNet Bridge - Nguyen Ha Dong, the father of "Flappy bird," the game that has caused a global fever, left a message on his Twitter Dong Nguyen--on February 8 night that he would take down the game from App Store and Google Play.
Vietnamesegame makes the gamers' world feverish
Dong affirmed that the decision does not relate to any legal issues. He just cannot keep it anymore. He also affirmed that he will not sell Flappy Bird and he will continue making games.
Some foreign newspapers have raised the doubts that Dong copied the ideas of other foreign made games.
Prior to that, Dong said on local newspapers that it took him 2-3 days only to make Flappy Bird and he used the graphics of some other games.
He once said on The Verge that when creating the bird, he was inspirited by Cheep Cheep of Mario game, and the green chimneys in Flappy bird were inspired from Nintendo games he usually played in his childhood.
Flappy bird has made the world's gamers' community feverish. It is … [Read more...] about Ha Dong unexpectedly “declares death” for Flappy Bird